Captain's Log: Passing the Horn of Midnight

"If you see the teeth of the lion, do not think that the lion is smiling at you."

Al-Mutanabbi

To this I would add, "If you stick you head in the mouth of the lion, do not think the lion is kissing you."

I am once again at the helm of the Night Ship, headed into the long channels of the Dark.  If I reach the Morning Isles, I will say one prayer for you, one prayer for me, and one prayer for the sleep we've lost along the way.

Now take the wheel while I go below for coffee and self pity.

38: The Strontium Year

As is our custom here at the Alcelogue, three hundred sixty-five days of consecutive living is a time to reflect, sum up, and otherwise excavate the past for any valuable lessons. So what have I learned?


1. Gratitude is the key to inner peace.  When I consciously call to mind the people who love me and the other blessings in my life,  I immediately let go of whatever negativity I'm holding.  Resentment is useless.

2. My brain is only useful when I need it to do something.  All the unsolicited "advice" it gives me is meaningless.

3. I deserve to live a happy, peaceful, completely fulfilled life surrounded by comfort, beauty, and healthy, inspiring influences.

4. Life can be is effortless if I want it to be.

5. I don't feel good when I don't exercise and when I don't eat like a human being (yes, I actually had to learn this one).



Now how's that as a plan for living?

Robust, But Light On The Tongue

His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.

-James Joyce

I don't need fine wines, aged single malt whiskeys, rare cheeses, or any other obscure delectable delights for my tongue when I have the finely crafted words of brilliant writers.

Take a sentence like the one above and roll it around in your mouth.  Speak it slowly, savoring the rhythm and the flow.  

This is what is means to devour books.  You can read to fill up your time just as easily as you can eat to fill your stomach.  Or you can read to taste the flavors of human thought, human expression, and human experience.   

A good sentence will satisfy me for days.

If you run across a particularly tasty one, drop me a line.

Do I Have Mentalism?

Please answer as honestly as possible:

1. Do you lose time from work due to thinking?

Yes. Sometimes I even hide in the bathroom and think.

2. Is thinking making your home life unhappy?

Yes. Sometimes I think that my thinking is the cause of all our unhappiness.

3. Is thinking affecting your reputation?

Yes. People have stopped inviting me to parties because of the way I think.

4. Have you ever felt remorse after thinking?

Yes. My God, after a night of binge thinking...sometimes I can't even look at myself in the mirror.

5. Do you crave a think at a definite time every day?

Yes. Usually I wake up and have to have that first thought just to get out of bed.

6. Do you want to think even after thinking has made you sick?

Yes. I know how thinking will make me feel, but I don't care - I have to think or I'll feel worse!

7. Do you ever think alone?

Yes. Sometimes I don't want anyone to see me thinking because I know they're judging how much I think.

8. Have you ever had a complete loss of memory as a result of thinking?

Yes. Once I thought for three days straight and when I stopped thinking, I was in Fresno with no memory of how I got there.

9. Is thinking jeopardizing your job or business?

Yes. My thinking is taking this company down in flames.

10. Have you ever been to a hospital or institution because of your thinking?

Yes. I was arrested on a 5150 because I was running through the streets naked and thinking out loud.

Results:

You have a thinking problem!

Grown Folk Wisdom

Finally, I come upon something useful stuck in the Web...

L'CHAIM!!!!!!!!

My nephew! Welcome to the Party, little man!

Read-Whatcha-Got Challenge: An Update and a Confession

First the update:

12. Thomas Wolfe "Look Homeward Angel"

While I did write this name on my list and strike a line through it, I didn't finish it. I started it eagerly and after about forty pages, I just couldn't go on. Wolfe's prose is full of energy and crammed with ideas, but is just one shade off of purple, which is far too close for me. Let's call his prose violet. Next!

19. Deborah Harkness "A Discovery of Witches"

Easily the smartest vampire/witch/etc book I've ever read. Detailed world-building and humanly-drawn inhuman characters make the book very easy to get lost in, which is the way a book about monsters should be. What I didn't like about the story was the pacing. Far too long and lingering in the wrong places. The heroine, a witch who doesn't know how powerful she really is, spends too much of the story not knowing how powerful she really is. The damsel-in-distress act gets repetitive. While it is crucial for an author to love her characters, she must be ready at a moment's notice to drag their asses through Hell. Harkness mollycoddles her lead characters for three hundred pages and just when things get interesting, the book ends and we are told to wait for the sequel. Which of course I'll read, but I won't be happy about it.

34. Janna Levin "How the Universe Got Its Spots"

This is a wonderful diary by an astrophysicist/cosmologist as she pursues the shape of the Universe and explains how she came to the field. It's a treat to be inside a mind like this. We see her work and her life and along the way learn the ins and out of cosmic topology, relativity both special and general, and why the Universe might be a finite place. I'll admit that a couple of times the math shot right over my head, but for the most part Levin takes care to avoid that.

23. Mary Doria Russell "Doc"

A well-told story - no, yarn, in the best sense - about Doc Holliday and his life before the OK Corral. In Russell's hands, Doc is a living, breathing (painfully, due to the tuberculosis) human being. He is a deep soul, who spends each day with Death and in true Southern form, greets him with a drink and witty joke. The story shifts skillfully from one character to another, getting in their heads without having to rely on first-person narrative. It's a highly crafted narrative technique that Russell makes look effortless. This is NOT an easy thing to do and when it's done well, the reader doesn't even notice. I also loved the fact that Doc's Georgian accent comes through crystal clear without reading like dialect. It brought me back to Savannah every time he said something.

And now the confession: I bought a new book. Yes, I know, but the thing is, I'm going to read it before April 1st. My only saving grace is that I have to read it for work. No, that is not cheating. Why? Shut up! that's why.